Don't Let Poor Business Writing Kill Your Career

Regardless of your job, it's important to know how to communicate effectively in all types of business documents—and that includes using the proper grammar, word usage, style consistency, etc. As indicated in a recent blog from the Harvard Business Review, a lack of attention to such details can hurt your chances for career advancement. In the post, Grammarly CEO Brad Hoover summarized his company's study of 100 LinkedIn profiles. Here are some of the highlights: Professionals who failed to make a director-level position within the first 10 years of their careers made more than twice as many grammatical mistakes as those who did obtain a director's position. Those with one to four promotions over 10 years made 45 percent more of these errors than those with six to nine promotions within that time. "If you are a native English speaker and never learned the difference between it's and its," Hoover writes, "especially given access to Google, an employer might wonder what else you've failed to learn that might be useful." Beyond getting the basics right, you also should pay attention to these 10 other qualities of good business writing, compiled from online sites such as Lifehack.org and SiliconValleyResources.com.

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Don't Let Poor Business Writing Kill Your Career

Tight Fit Avoid superfluous phrases, such as "The purpose of this report that I am submitting today is ...."